Good people of South Carolina face the scary prospect of being led by their philandering Governor Mark Sanford for another 18 months.

That's right. The love-smitten Republican has a year and a half left in his term. This blogger can’t believe the upright citizens of the Palmetto State can put up with more embarrassing emotional outbursts and sobbing from their leader. Isn’t S.C. still a member of the Bible Belt? When will it sink in that S.C. will become the laughingstock of the nation if Sanford is allowed to hang in there?

Crazed media advisors have been trotting out S.C.'s Don Juan in a redemption tour before anybody with a camera or pencil and reporter’s note pad. The teary-eyed phony (Sanford demanded the resignation of Bill Clinton following his liaison with Monica Lewinsky) divulged to the Associated Press yesterday: “This was a whole lot more than a simple affair, this was a love story. A forbidden one, a tragic one, but a love story at the end of the day.” How cheesy! Sanford, whose national political aspirations are dead, may have a new career writing Harlequin novels.

In the "who cares" dept, we have learned that Sanford’s Argentine girl friend is actually “his soul mate.” It's unclear where that leaves Casanova Mark’s wife of 20 years, Jenny. Roommate? Ex-wife?

S.C.'s skirt chaser-in-chief also admitted casual sexual encounters with other women. “There were a handful of instances wherein I crossed the lines I shouldn’t have crossed as a married man but never crossed the ultimate line,” said Sanford, mimicking his new idol Clinton, who once famously said: “I never had sex with that woman.”

Sanford's "ultimate line" crack could be the name of a reality show. Perhaps Mark could find time in his sexual travels to host the show.

The public was also treated with news that Mark The Rake had Manhattan and Hamptons romantic trysts with Maria Belen Chapur, the 43-year-old mother of two who is now gleefully skewered by the press as a Latin American hottie or firecracker. S.C. tourism people should give Mark a call about those escapades. There are fine establishments in Myrtle Beach that are well suited for romantic getaways.

As of Monday, half of South Carolina believes Sanford should remain in office. That’s hard to figure especially since Sanford, the guy who recently “on principle” was willing to turn down parts of the President Obama’s economic stimulus package, is now plainly outed as a guy with no principles at all.

Here’s wishing best of luck to Jenny and her four sons. The Mark Sanford story can’t end soon enough.